Most Ewaste goes to Asia, the plan increases the already growing incentive to dump there.
Mathias Schluep, Dr. of tech and science at Empa research institute, Switzerland, 7/27/2007 (“Intel Brief: E-waste hazards” http://ewasteguide.info/newsandevents/intel-)
Due to projected increases in electronic waste (e-waste) and lax enforcement of regulations, it is likely that hazardous shipments of e-waste to China and India will increase over the next three years, while Nigeria will increasingly become a dumping ground for the hazardous material.
Currently, companies export 80 percent of the world's electronic trash to Asia, and 90 percent of this flows into China, according to a BBC report. Environmentalists in China have begun to express concern about the large quantities of e-waste that wealthy countries continue to dump in the developing world.
E-waste is consumer and business electronic equipment that is near or at the end of its useful life. Certain components of electronic products contain materials that render them hazardous, and include heavy metals such as lead, cadmium, mercury and arsenic. Many of these elements are extremely valuable, such as gold and platinum, while the majority of them are non-renewable.
Consumers discard an estimated 14 to 20 million personal computers every year just in the US, while activist groups expect developing nations to triple their output of all electronic waste by 2010.
Most Ewaste goes to Asia, the plan increases the already growing incentive to dump there.
Mathias Schluep, Dr. of tech and science at Empa research institute, Switzerland, 7/27/2007 (“Intel Brief: E-waste hazards” http://ewasteguide.info/newsandevents/intel-)Due to projected increases in electronic waste (e-waste) and lax enforcement of regulations, it is likely that hazardous shipments of e-waste to China and India will increase over the next three years, while Nigeria will increasingly become a dumping ground for the hazardous material.
Currently, companies export 80 percent of the world's electronic trash to Asia, and 90 percent of this flows into China, according to a BBC report. Environmentalists in China have begun to express concern about the large quantities of e-waste that wealthy countries continue to dump in the developing world.
E-waste is consumer and business electronic equipment that is near or at the end of its useful life. Certain components of electronic products contain materials that render them hazardous, and include heavy metals such as lead, cadmium, mercury and arsenic. Many of these elements are extremely valuable, such as gold and platinum, while the majority of them are non-renewable.
Consumers discard an estimated 14 to 20 million personal computers every year just in the US, while activist groups expect developing nations to triple their output of all electronic waste by 2010.